scene - las vegas convention center, icsc, 162 f street, 12:54pm
four hours and six minutes until i can officially close up shop here at the show. the tumbleweeds keep rolling past my booth and the pigeons have flown in to reclaim their territory (yeah, not kidding on the latter).
the good news is, i survived. i survived arriving at the airport to learn that i was only allowed one bag and not two (finally, not watching the news bites me in the behind). i survived the flight delayed due to ‘mechanical’ problems. i survived 109 degree temperatures. i survived manning a trade show booth for the first time in my life. i survived the questions i didn’t have answers for. i survived the intense amount of pain in my quads, developed by the equivalent of doing squats 8 hours a day for three days straight. up down. up down. up down.
and i also managed to finish ‘the host’ (more on this at another time), see an amazing show, meet a lot of great people, spend quality time with my boss, not lose a dime, and enjoy the bathtub in my room. twice. every day. quads and all…
ironically, i’m kind of a first timer at this. don’t get me wrong, i’ve worked on too many trade shows for my liking. but this is the first time i have taken it from booth conceptualization to onsite show management. i’ve coordinated drayage and shipping and electrical and carpet. but i’ve never led the design process and the marketing, and i have most certainly never been the ‘face’ of the company. even with eleven years in, there is still something new, and that is exciting.
i still can’t say i like trade shows any better than i did. but, i do like to do different things, face new challenges, and expand the repertoire. there isn’t a lot i haven’t done in this industry. i’ve “thrown” chairs. i’ve pulled air walls. i’ve conducted site searches. i’ve learned how to negotiate contracts. i’ve learned how to work with operations staff earning minimum wage, and executive staff earning more than i’ll make in my lifetime. short of sales (and my desire for ‘something different’ does not reach that far), there is no single part of the industry that i haven’t been involved in at some time.
i love what i do. i always have. and i’ve been lucky and blessed. i’ve spent 95% of my career working at good companies, with and for good people. i don’t know how many can truly say that. for a long time, i felt the need to justify that i never finished my degree. at 20 years old, and only part way through my schooling, i was offered a choice. finish school to earn a degree that would help me get a job i really wanted, or take the job offered to me, that i really wanted.
unfortunately, i couldn’t do both. the travel required by the job i was being offered would preclude any formal education, and in those days, there were no such thing as online degrees. maybe i should be more embarrassed by this, but for me, it was a no brainer. and never once have i regretted that decision.
that’s not to say i haven’t had to explain it a few-hundred times over the years—particularly to potential employers. but in the end, it didn’t matter. i never felt that it prevented me from being offered a job, and a few years ago, employers stopped asking. every once in a blue moon, it will still come up. but with 11 years in, it’s certainly not deterring me.
i don’t typically think of a profession as a ‘calling’, but there is no doubt in my mind that there was some divine guidance in mine. and with every good experience i have, good company, good co-workers, good boss..it is reaffirmed.
this particular show was the first time shauna and i have traveled together, and it only furthered my respect and appreciation of her as both boss and colleague. though i will stand by my initial assessment of her from my interviewing days—that i’ve never met someone so hard to read—it’s for completely different reasons than i would have guessed. i think as a culture we are trained on a very subtle level to distrust. so many hidden agendas, so much spin, so many walls. what you see is not what you get, and if it seems to good to be true, it probably is…right?
well, not so with shauna—at least, her hidden agendas aren’t hidden, her spin isn’t spun, and are walls are pretty easy to hop over. even though i am much the same way, it still can be slightly jarring at first. it took a little time to realize that it’s not so much that she was ever hard to read, but more that i assumed that that the façade was just that, a façade. perhaps true, but perhaps not the whole story.
i don’t mean to imply that she has no depth, or that she can’t hold her tongue when necessary, but, i know that when she tells me something it’s because it’s true. she is direct, she is decisive, and she is fair. she trusts people to do their jobs and only steps in to guide when direction or course correction is actually needed.
as such, she has earned my loyalty too, and her respect matters to me. beyond that though, this trip gave me the chance to see that i also genuinely enjoy her as a person, not just as a boss.
there have been many people who have shown generosity to me over the years, in a variety of ways. i am always profoundly grateful, and always a bit surprised. maybe because i know that at heart, i’m selfish and i have to work not to be, it always amazes me that there are people who at the very core of their beings are selfless. selflessness is a trait i haven’t mastered, but i have seen it time and time again in people i’ve been fortunate enough to know.
it presents itself in many ways, but on this trip, it presented itself in the form of tickets. tickets to cirque du soleil ‘love’.
- intermission -
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